The Nine Day Queen

Dear Everybody

I have just come back from an evening with Cheryl. We sat in her cosy kitchen chatting about all kinds of things, books we had read lately... The conversation began to lean towards Tudor history and eventually to Lady Jane Grey, the "Nine Day Queen" of England. I was sure that she had been regent as Edward was too young to rule himself. When he eventually died, she took the throne as his first cousin and then was arrested by Mary Tudor's cronies, thrown in the tower and promptly done away with.

I was wrong. "I'm sure that's not right," said Cheryl shaking her head, who'd just finished a book by the wonderful Alison Weir on the subject. "They were the same age. She was named Queen in her own right. Northumberland persuaded Edward to change his will upon his deathbed and give the crown to Jane." We googled and indeed, Cheryl was absolutely right.

As Queen Victoria was England's longest reigning Queen, Lady Jane Grey was its shortest.

Poor Jane. She was a victim from her birth right through to her death. And she was brilliant. She excelled in arts and languages, like Elizabeth, her cousin, and was one of the greatest brains of her time despite her tender age. Her parents were monsters and in this day and age would have been done for child abuse. Lucky that she was sent away at the age of ten to live with Catherine Parr, probably the happiest few years of her life, although she was later forced into a marriage by her parents with a boy she considered a bully and a thug. She was indeed named Queen by Edward as the poor little fifteen year old lay there dying. When finally she was arrested following the Wyatt uprising, noone came to her aid. her father did nothing and her mother couldn't have given two hoots. Less than a month after her husband met the fate of so many of that time for high treason (head...allez hop!), the old bat married again and never ever mentioned Jane again. What a cruel woman.

Here's what Wikipedia has to say about Lady Jane Grey:

"Jane had a difficult childhood. Even for the harsher standards of the time, Frances Brandon was an abusive, cruel, and domineering woman who felt that Jane was weak and gentle and held her under a strict disciplinary regime. Her daughter's meekness and quiet, unassuming manner irritated Frances who sought to 'harden' the child with regular beatings. Devoid of a mother's love and craving affection and understanding, Jane turned to books as solace and quickly mastered skills in the arts and languages. However, she felt that nothing she could do would please her parents. Speaking to a visitor, Cambridge scholar Roger Ascham, tutor to the Lady Elizabeth, she said:

"For when I am in the presence of either Father or Mother, whether I speak, keep silence, sit, stand or go, eat, drink, be merry or sad, be sewing, playing, dancing, or doing anything else, I must do it as it were in such weight, measure and number, even so perfectly as God made the world; or else I am so sharply taunted, so cruelly threatened, yes presently sometimes with pinches, nips and bobs and other ways ... that I think myself in hell."

In 1546, at less than 10 years old, Jane was sent to live as the ward of 35-year old Catherine Parr, then Queen Consort of England, who married Henry VIII in 1543. At this time, Jane became acquainted with her royal cousins, Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth. Catherine was a sensible, maternal woman who was excellent with children, and with Jane, she was no exception. It is probable that Jane's days as Catherine's ward were the happiest of her life.

After Henry VIII died, Catherine Parr married Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley. Unfortunately, Catherine died shortly after the birth of her only child, Mary Seymour, in late 1548, leaving the young Jane once again bereft of a maternal figure. Jane acted as chief mourner at Catherine's funeral.

Thomas Seymour proposed marrying Jane to the newly crowned Edward VI of England, but Thomas's brother, Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset, who ruled as Lord Protector, had arranged a match for the king with Princess Elisabeth of France, daughter of Henry II of France. With two conflicting goals, the Seymour brothers engaged in a power struggle. The marriage between Edward and Jane never happened, primarily because of the young king's ill-health. The Seymour brothers were eventually tried for treason and executed after a coup by the ambitious John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland.

Jane was next contracted in marriage to Lord Hertford, the eldest son of the late Duke of Somerset. However, ongoing negotiations between her mother, Frances Brandon, and Northumberland led to a proposed marriage to Lord Guilford Dudley, son of the newly powerful Duke. Jane considered Guilford Dudley an arrogant bully, and had stated her preference for a single life, but her mother made her submit to the arrangement. The couple were married, at Durham House on 21 May 1553.

At the time of Edward's death, the crown would pass to Mary and her male heirs. If she died without male issue, the crown would pass to Elizabeth and her male heirs. If she also died without male issue, the crown would pass to any male issue of Frances Brandon. In the absence of male children born to Frances, the crown would pass to any male children Jane might have.

When Edward VI lay dying in 1553 at age 15, his Catholic half-sister Mary was still the heiress presumptive to the throne. However, Edward named the (Protestant) heirs of his father's sister, Mary Tudor as his successors in a will composed on his deathbed, perhaps under the persuasion of Northumberland. Edward and Northumberland knew that this effectively left the throne to Edward's cousin, Lady Jane Grey, who (like them) staunchly supported Protestantism. This may have contravened customary testatory law because Edward had not reached the legal testatory age of 21. More importantly, many contemporary legal theorists believed the monarch could not contravene an Act of Parliament, even in matters of the succession; Jane's claim to the throne therefore remained obviously weak. Other historians believed that the King could basically rule through divine right. Henry VII had, after all, seized the throne from Richard III on the battlefield.

Edward VI died on 6 July 1553. Four days later, Northumberland had Lady Jane Grey proclaimed Queen of England after she had taken up a secure residence in the Tower of London, where English monarchs customarily resided from the time of accession until coronation. Jane refused to name her husband Dudley as king by letters patent and deferred to Parliament. She offered to make him Duke of Clarence instead.

Portrait after Robert Smirke showing Lady Jane Grey being asked to take the throne.

Northumberland faced a number of key tasks in order to consolidate his power after Edward's death. Most importantly, he had to isolate and, ideally, capture Lady Mary in order to prevent her from gathering support around her. Mary, however, learned of his intentions and took flight, sequestering herself in Framlingham Castle in Suffolk. Within only nine days, Mary had found sufficient support to ride into London in a triumphal procession. Parliament declared Mary the rightful queen and denounced and revoked Jane's proclamation as having been coerced. Mary imprisoned Jane and her husband in the Gentleman Gaoler's apartments at the Tower of London, although their lives were initially spared. The Duke of Northumberland was executed on 21 August 1553.

Jane and Lord Guilford Dudley were both charged with high treason, together with two of Dudley's brothers (Sarah's note: why is it always down to Dudley???!! My poor cat had nothing whatsoever to do with anything). Their trial, by a special commission, took place on 13 November 1553, at the Guildhall in the City of London. The two principal defendants were found guilty and sentenced to death. Jane's sentence was that she "be burned alive [the traditional English punishment for treason committed by women] on Tower Hill or beheaded as the Queen pleases." However, the imperial ambassador reported to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, that her life was to be spared.

The Execution of Lady Jane Grey (le Supplice de Jeanne Grey) by French Romantic painter Paul Delaroche, 1833.

The Protestant rebellion of Thomas Wyatt the younger in late January 1554 sealed Jane's fate, although she had nothing to do with it directly. Wyatt's rebellion started as a popular revolt, precipitated by the imminent marriage of Mary to the Roman Catholic Prince Philip (later King of Spain from 1556 to 1598). Jane's father (the Duke of Suffolk) and other nobles joined the rebellion, calling for Jane's restoration as queen. Philip and his councillors pressed Mary to execute Jane to put an end to any future focus for unrest. Five days after Wyatt's arrest, Jane and Guilford were executed.

On the morning of 12 February 1554, the authorities took Guilford from his rooms at the Tower of London to the public execution place at Tower Hill and there had him beheaded. A horse and cart brought his remains back to the Tower of London, past the rooms where Jane remained as a prisoner. Jane was then taken out to Tower Green, inside the Tower of London, and beheaded in private. With few exceptions, only royalty were offered the privilege of a private execution; Jane's execution was conducted in private on the orders of Queen Mary, as a gesture of respect for her cousin.

According to the account of her execution given in the anonymous Chronicle of Queen Jane and of Two Years of Queen Mary, which formed the basis for Raphael Holinshed's depiction, Jane gave a speech upon ascending the scaffold:

Good people, I am come hither to die, and by a law I am condemned to the same. The fact, indeed, against the Queen's highness was unlawful, and the consenting thereunto by me: but touching the procurement and desire thereof by me or on my behalf, I do wash my hands thereof in innocency, before God, and the face of you, good Christian people, this day.

She then recited Psalm 51 (Have mercy upon me, O God) in English, and handed her gloves and handkerchief to her maid. John Feckenham, a Roman Catholic chaplain sent by Mary who had failed to convert Jane, stayed with her during the execution. The executioner asked her forgiveness, and she gave it. She pleaded the axeman, "I pray you dispatch me quickly". Referring to her head, she asked, "Will you take it off before I lay me down?" and the axeman answered, "No, madam". She then blindfolded herself. Jane had resolved to go to her death with dignity, but once blindfolded, failing to find the block with her hands, began to panic and cried, "What shall I do? Where is it?" An unknown hand, possibly Feckenham's, then helped her find her way and retain her dignity at the end. With her head on the block, Jane spoke the last words of Jesus as recounted by Luke: "Lord, into thy hands I commend my spirit!" She was then beheaded.

"The traitor-heroine of the Reformation", as historian Albert Pollard called her, was merely 16 or 17 years old at the time of her execution. Apparently, Frances Brandon made no attempt, pleading or otherwise, to save her daughter's life; Jane's father already awaited execution for his part in the Wyatt rebellion. Jane and Guilford are buried in the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula on the north side of Tower Green. Queen Mary lived for only four years after she ordered the death of her cousin.

Henry, Duke of Suffolk, Jane's father, was executed a week after Jane, on 19 February 1554. Merely three weeks after her husband's death and not even a month since her daughter's, Frances Brandon shocked the English court by marrying Master of the Horse and chamberlain, Adrian Stokes. Some historians believe she deliberately chose to do this to distance herself from her previous status. She was fully pardoned by Mary and allowed to live at Court with her two surviving daughters. She is not known to have mentioned Jane ever again and was seemingly as indifferent to her child in death as she had been in life."

So there it is, the tragic life of Lady Jane Grey, the briefest Queen in English history - and perhaps the most tragic. Young, beautiful, intelligent, she should have had a dazzling future, but instead she was horribly betrayed, abused by her own parents, a puppet to Northumberland's dasterdly hunger for power...

See here for further cultural depictions of Lady Jane Grey.

Articles on Lady Jane also found in the Telegraph, Yale Alumni Magazine, Yale Daily News, Daily Mail , The New Yorker.

Art Galleries featuring Lady Jane Grey portraits: The Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge,  The Yale Centre for British Art, The National Portrait Gallery in London, and The V&A Museum.

Comments

[Little Me]

Coincidence - I have always been fascinated by Lady Jane Grey and am actually reading a historical novel about her called Innocent Traitor, written by Alison Weir. I think it is her first foray into fiction - it is pretty good. I have read all her non-fiction books and devour every word she writes, although I don't always agree with her. I like the fiction books about the whole Tudor period as they put the non fiction into a more visual form - Philippa Forrester always makes for good pageturners. Just be aware of the writers changing history to suit their own stories - what's wrong with a bit of creative licence?

As for Katherine Parr's daughter, I'll have a look at my Starkeys et al to see if I can find anything. Never really thought about it before.. shall keep you posted.

[Lallie's mama]

I had no idea of this episode in English history, but how bloody it was! Young Jane was just a pawn than her uncle and parents moved the way if suited them best.. In the end, the only one who fared better was that wicked mother... I have to read more but Foucquet just pulled my sleeve... soi disant.
Thank you for remembering her on this blog!